Newsletter Growth Secrets: Don't Make These Costly Mistakes

Quick, what do you get when you divide three thousand by five?

Well, yes, arithmetically you DO get six hundred. But the real answer is that you get joy. Lots and lots of joy.

Because three thousand is the number of subscribers currently subscribed to the First Class Founders newsletter and five is the number of months in which I made it happen.

Wanna know how? Strap in, I'm gonna show you the secret of how to fly high with YOUR newsletter...

Hi, my name is Yong-Soo Chung and I am a first-generation Korean-American entrepreneur living the American dream. I started Urban EDC to cater to enthusiasts of everyday carry gear. I also own two other successful ventures: GrowthJet, a climate-neutral certified third-party logistics company for emerging e-commerce brands, and SpottedByHumphrey, an online boutique curating dog goods for good dogs. Through these three ventures, my business has generated over $20 million dollars in 8 years and I'm here to tell you how YOU can do the same!

On this episode of First Class Founders, I am sharing my learnings from the last five months of me trying to grow my newsletter, that is, the First Class Founders newsletter. The newsletter is a companion to this podcast and adds additional context and visuals to each podcast episode. I also share lessons learned growing my 3 companies in addition to building First Class Founders in public.

Over the course of this episode you will hear FIVE lessons from my journey to getting 3,000 subscribers for the First Class Founders newsletter, which will contain specific and actionable advice about stuff such as:

• What to look for while promoting your newsletter
• HOW to spend your money wisely
• WHERE to spend your money wisely

and, also...

• The one thing you need to have in your branding and messaging

In addition, premium members of First Class Founders will be treated to an extra segment of the podcast in which they will hear my experiments with email service provider Beehiiv's new "Boosts" feature and how I'm using it to supercharge my distribution and user-acquisition. I'll do a deep dive on specific tactics I recommend while using this new Boosts feature because I believe that the newsletter industry as a whole will move in this direction opening up an entirely new growth channel for newsletter operators. It’s an exciting time to be a newsletter operator, that’s for sure!

Become a premium member of First Class Founders by signing up at FirstClassFounders.com/join - I'll put the link in the show notes as well!

Let’s get down to business!

Six hundred per month. That’s an average of twenty subscribers every day. Or five subscribers every hour. That’s one new subscriber gained every time the hour hand shifts its position a notch on the clock dial - how’s that? The sentence “I’m gaining subscribers every time the clock hand moves!” has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

Some of you might make fun of me for celebrating the slowest hand on the clock but, hey, slow and steady wins the race! And I have receipts to prove it!

The fact that my newsletter acquired three thousand subscribers in five months humbles me because it means people want to hear what I have to say. And, currently, a little over three thousand of them are actively choosing to listen to me every week.

That is a HUGE ego-boost for me. For anyone, in fact.

But, First Class Founders is all about building in public. So, today, I'm gonna reveal all the lessons I learned growing my newsletter because there are some not-so-obvious strategies I figured out along the way during my journey to reaching three thousand subscribers in just five months. 

I would like it if you could check out the three other episodes I have previously published in my feed on this topic:

• Episode 22, titled "Newsletter Success Launch Plan: 4 Effective Strategies to Kickstart Your Newsletter"
• Episode 23, titled "Grow Your Newsletter Fast: Secrets to Skyrocketing Your Subscribers"
• Episode 27, titled "10 Powerful Tools to Boost Your Newsletter Growth"

Each of those episodes contains all my learnings at different stages of growing my newsletter - from 100 subscribers at launch, to 500 subscribers in three weeks, to 3000 subscribers in five months. The episodes detail the different tools and strategies I used at each stage of growth to help make the newsletter as successful as it is today.

I recommend that you queue up the episodes in your podcast player right now and listen to them after finishing this one. That way, you will be able to ingest all my ideas on this subject and combine them to supercharge your own newsletter. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Ready? Perfect! Let's get started with the first lesson, right away

LESSON ONE: Paid ads are underrated.

To be perfectly honest, I was pretty skeptical of using paid ads to promote my newsletter. Back when I published episodes 22 and 23, I had mentioned that I wasn't using paid ads to promote my newsletter. But in episode 27, I actively asked you to consider using paid ads. What changed? Well, the short answer is - Twitter changed.

Specifically, Twitter was purchased by Elon Musk whose, uh, 'decisions' drove a lot of advertisers away from Twitter. Many companies were forced to publicly state that they would be pulling Twitter from their advertising strategies and budgets.

That meant *I* no longer had to compete with the massive advertising budgets of companies like Apple, Google, IBM, Coke, and such others to promote MY tweets. Suddenly, I found that promoting one of my tweets was way cheaper. I could reach a much LARGER audience at just a fraction of the cost.

The moment I knew what type of audience I was targeting, using Twitter Ads was a no-brainer. I had a nice fire going and these "Promoted Tweets" was like adding jet-fuel and turning it into a raging inferno.

I know what you are thinking, "Yong-Soo, how could you advertise on Twitter! With all that Elon has done, why would you want to do that?" Well, you're gonna hate me for this but the fact of the matter is my audience spends time and attention on Twitter. Not Facebook. Not Instagram. Maybe Linkedin. But definitely Twitter. And who is my audience? You, who else?!

I always say to go where your audience hangs out. Well, at the moment, that is Twitter more than any other platform. It also happens to be the platform and format that I am more comfortable with - I actively prefer Twitter over Linkedin for now.

So, if YOU choose to spend time on a platform owned by Elon, I don't mind spending money to get your attention! Especially because Twitter Ads were underpriced for the last 2 months, so I took full advantage of the opportunity.

Now, they are getting more expensive again and the ROI is gonna get worse, so I'll try and experiment with different platforms.

Here's the simple truth, like anything else you purchase or invest in, paid ads too are a game of finding value where no one is looking. For a while, that happened to be Twitter. And that situation might be changing rapidly.

In any case, Twitter was just an example of the larger point I was trying to make, which was...

LESSON ONE: Paid ads are underrated when it comes to user-acquisition!

Alright, the next lesson also derives from my interactions on Twitter but it can apply to any and every platform that you are active on.

LESSON TWO: Auto-DMs are your friend.

Every platform has a way to directly communicate with each user. Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat call them DMs. Reddit calls them PMs. LinkedIn uses the terms messages and InMailTM. Facebook has its own messenger.

Whatever platform you choose, you can be sure that it has a feature to contact and open a direct line of communication with another user on that platform. This direct line of communication is one of the best ways to grow your newsletter because it allows you to reach new subscribers of your newsletter directly.

No, I know fully well about the whole 'sliding into DMs' thing and how it almost always gets a bad rap. And it is not surprising because most cold DMs are either trolls, spam, or worse, scams. I'm pretty sure you have received at least one DM telling you the credentials of an account containing some fraction of bitcoin that is "waiting for you".

But I use cold DMs in a way that my followers THANK me when I DM them.

How? Let me explain.

First off, I don't send cold DMs to anyone randomly. I send cold DMs ONLY to NEW followers. And my first line is: "Hey, thanks for the follow!"

Did you see what I did there?

I established a clear relationship with those specifically chosen words. By saying 'Thanks for the follow' I make it clear that THEY were the ones who initiated the conversation and I was merely responding to their action.

Even though *I* was the person to DM them first.

And what's the typical response when someone thanks you for something? "You're welcome!" Or "No problem!" both of which are implicit invitations to continue the conversation. Or, at the very least, a tacit approval of the cold DM that I sent them.

Establishing this from the start sets the tone of the conversation right from the beginning. It's extremely subtle but it works well because now you have them responding to a conversation that YOU started. From this point on, the conversation takes on a friendlier tone.

But, here's the thing, there isn't any time to waste.

Because (a) even though they are okay with my DM, I am still a stranger and (b) we live in an attention economy and they won't spend all of it on me.

I have to make the most of the attention I have captured. Also, people are busy and I respect their time. So, my second step is to tell them about my newsletter.

I send them a slightly longer message that goes something like this:

"BTW, each Wednesday, I share my most successful...

- Metrics
- Growth Hacks
- Business Frameworks

...so you can build your audience & make more money.

If you are an entrepreneur, I literally write this newsletter FOR YOU.”

Then,  my next line is, “Sign up for free," followed by the link to my newsletter.

Then, I end the DM with a unique PS - a postscript - that helps keep the lines of communication open. Wanna know what that is? I’ll tell you about it but while I have your attention, let me quickly introduce you to our sponsor - Riverside!

And now, let's get back to the show. Before that short detour, I was about to tell you about my unique PS - postscript - at the end of my auto-DMs.

It is this: "My DMs are always open so feel free to reach out anytime! And let me tell you it WORKS wonders!

See, auto-DMs are a powerful tool in every content-creator's arsenal. Sadly, not many people know how to use them properly. I hope this little guide helps you improve your direct-messaging strategy because - and I am absolutely confident about this - auto-DMs work magically when done right.

And that's our second lesson for today.

LESSON TWO: Auto-DMs are your friend.

The next lesson also connects back to what I said back in episode 23. 

LESSON THREE: Cross promotions aren't great at this stage.

Back then, I remember clearly saying that cross-promotions can be a bit tricky to pull off...

{EPISODE 23 - 14:10

...can be a bit tricky to pull off since they require a great deal of research, coordination, and most importantly - trust.}

I mentioned using paid ads and cross-promotions as a growth strategy and spoke about "borrowing" other audiences to grow your newsletter.

{EPISODE 23 - 14:10

4. “Borrow” other audiences by advertising or cross-promoting your content outside of your immediate network, you can find other support systems to lean on for such cross-promotions and collaborations. For example, there are discord channels where you can get recommendations for other newsletters to swap with.}

I still believe that to be true, however, I have slightly revised my stance on WHEN to do cross-promotions.

My experience so far has shown that cross-promotions are not very effective during the initial growth phase of your newsletter. Specifically, trying to cross-promote your newsletter BEFORE reaching three thousand subscribers doesn't result in a big uptick in your subscriber numbers.

And the main reason is this. If you’re a smaller newsletter cross promo’ing with other smaller newsletters, you’re not going to see huge results simply because your audience sizes are too small from purely a numbers perspective.

Also, there’s a lot of effort coordinating these cross promotions. I use a cross promotions calendar to help me keep track of the newsletter name, the exact link to use with the proper UTM tracking codes, and the blurb that I’ll be using. Also, I typically like to add a bit of my own personal touch so that requires a bit more work on my end as well.

So, what inevitably ends up happening is that you end up spending a lot of your time on searching and evaluating the right newsletter and the right audience to cross-promote each week.

That's a lot of work for very little reward.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't cross-promote. You absolutely should. It is still very much an effective way of reaching new audiences. It does what paid ads do and it does it at zero monetary cost to you.

But, even though you don't spend cold hard cash, you still end up spending a lot of your time - especially if you are determined to make your cross-promos successful.

I guess what I am saying is cross-promos are a useful strategy to grow your newsletter but keep your expectations in check.

LESSON THREE: Cross promotions aren't great at this stage.

But, I can already hear you saying, "Yong-soo, why change who you promote based on what you write? Why not just choose a newsletter and promote the entirety of it instead?"

Yup, you are absolutely right. And that is...

LESSON FOUR: Swapping recommendations is magical.

I have come to realize that swapping recommendations is the secret sauce. Swapping recommendations helps your newsletter grow rapidly because you are no longer constrained by the same constraints that applied when you were doing cross-promos.

In other words, swapping recommendations is the next level to doing cross-promos.

Just to be clear, when I say swapping recommendations, I mean you recommend someone else's newsletter and they recommend yours as part of the subscriber sign-up flow. This can be done with or without a monetary component to it and I'll tell you how to do both.

Here's the thing - both these methods require you to lay the groundwork first. That means checking out a wide variety of newsletters and reading a lot of material written by others. But, most of the time, this has the wonderful side-effect of increasing your knowledge and meeting some amazing other creators as well, so I'm not complaining at all!

Oh, and here's the thing: you DON'T need to scour the internet to look for newsletters. This isn't prehistoric internet. We aren't savages. We now have significantly large, active communities of newsletter authors. One of them is Newsletter Blueprint, run by Paul Metcalfe, which I have also previously mentioned in, again, episode 23!

{EPISODE 23 - 14:30 - One of them that I highly recommend is called Newsletter Blueprint, run by Paul Metcalfe. You can connect with other newsletter creators and work out cross-promotion deals where each of you writes guest articles for the other. Check out newsletterblueprint.com for more details - I'll link to this in the show notes.}

During this research phase, make a note of THREE things for each newsletter that you come across - the approximate size of its audience, the approximate rate of growth, and whether it caters to the same audience as your own. Don't worry about whether they write the same kind of content as you - not yet.

A quick side-note here. The size of audience is a consideration only because newsletters with huge audience sizes might not respond to newsletters with smaller audience sizes unless you’re pretty well-known in the creator space. So, even if they serve the same audience as yours, the chances of you swapping recommendations with them are very, VERY low. That's the only reason to compare audience sizes actually - to make sure that you aren't aiming too high.

In fact, that is why I explicitly mentioned the growth-rate as being more important than the audience size in episode 23 - remember this?

{EPISODE 23 - 19:14 - The growth-rate of a newsletter is more important than the size of its list. A fast-growing newsletter will help you find a more engaged audience for your newsletter.}

If the newsletter matches the first three criteria - size of audience, rate of growth, and serves a similar audience - then you should chalk it down as a match for potential recommendation.

Okay, so now you have a list of newsletters that you have shortlisted for swapping recommendations. Now what?

Now, reach out to them and see if you can strike a deal with them!

Yeah, just like that. 

Quite simple and straightforward, really. I’ve found most newsletter creators to be pretty open to working something out.

The second way involves buying recommendations and being paid for recommendations - just like you would do with paid ads. It still requires you to do the groundwork. Because there is no point paying money to get recommended by a newsletter with a HUGE audience that has no interest in your content. Remember the exclusion principle that David Hooper mentioned in the previous episode of this podcast, Episode 34, How to Build a Million Dollar Audience with Podcast Legend David Hooper of Big Podcast? Sometimes, growing your audience means explicitly excluding the ones who don't fit the kind of audience you want for your product

{EPISODE 34 - “But, I always suggest people flip that on its head and say, how can I exclude people? That's how to attract people. And because of that, you're going to grow your audience.”}

Yeah. That's why the size of the audience doesn't really matter. There's no point digging in an emerald mine if what you really want are diamonds.

Beehiiv, by the way, has something called Boosts which is kinda like a paid-recommendation feature. Boosts allows me to pay to acquire subscribers from other newsletters and vice versa. I can recommend other newsletters as sponsored recommendations and be paid for it.

No, Beehiiv isn't paying me to praise them here. I'm genuinely in LOVE with the Boosts feature and I hope more newsletters use it. I do have an ulterior motive but you will see that it is a win-win situation, once I explain how I use it for the First Class Founders newsletter.

The concept behind Boosts is exactly what you think it is - you can offer money to other newsletters to 'boost' your newsletter to their audiences.

BUT, and this is the smart bit in my opinion, YOU get to decide which newsletter 'boosts' you. The process requires them to 'apply' for your Boosts and you can accept or reject their application. Additionally, you pay only for those subscribers who sign up using their 'boosted link' and, according to Beehiiv, you only pay for the 'active, engaged subscribers.

Of course, the reverse also works, that is, you can apply to 'boost' other newsletters, that is, recommend them to your subscribers. You can 'apply' to boost their newsletter and you get paid if your subscribers become 'active engaging subscribers' for the newsletters that accept your application.

The smarter ones among you must have already spotted the arbitrage play here. You can pay people to recommend your newsletter but you can also GET PAID to recommend other newsletters! That's why I want more people to start using Boosts by Beehiiv - not only does valuable knowledge get shared but you also get to make a few extra bucks while doing it!

And there is SO. MUCH. MORE. that is awesome about Boosts. There is a specific way to use Boosts that enhances the already-awesome value that it provides and I am about to do an entire segment on how to leverage Boosts to its maximum potential.
But - and you know what I'm gonna say next - you'll need to be a premium member of First Class Founders to find out all about it!

So, yeah, Boosts by Beehiiv - if you aren't using it properly, then you aren't making the most of a pretty amazing tool that can grow your newsletter rapidly.

In any case, paid or unpaid, Boosts or otherwise, what it ultimately boils down to is this:

LESSON FOUR: Swapping recommendations is magical.

And that brings us to the fifth and final lesson.

LESSON FIVE: Consistency in everything is key.

Yeah, yeah, you have heard this one so many times it has now become a cliche at this point. (dramatically) 'If you want to grow your  audience consistently,you need to create content consistently.' Of course you know that!

Publishing consistently is not a growth-tactic. It's a fundamental requirement. It's the foundation of being a content-creator. If you are not publishing consistently, then NONE of these tactics will help you. No amount of paid ads, or boosts, or cross-promos, or recommendations will get you the large audience that you are dreaming of - trust me.

But that's NOT the consistency I am referring to here.

What I'm talking about is consistency in the content itself. Your content needs to 'feel' the same to everyone, everywhere, no matter what platform they consume it on. You can have different personas on each platform but the content itself should always be consistent.

That means having the SAME voice, branding, and messaging on all platforms.

Take the example of First Class Founders itself. This podcast and the companion newsletter are both aimed at the same audience - entrepreneurs and founders. All of my content is designed to interest them and engage them. I focus on stuff that they will engage with and that means not sharing silly cat videos or weird TikTok dances in any of the content I publish.

You know what else is aimed at the same audience? My Twitter posts. My Linkedin profile. I might not be promoting them as frequently as some of my other stuff but you will notice that my content on those platforms also reflects the same ethos as my podcast and newsletter.

This is possible because I sat down and defined the premise behind what First Class Founders was about even BEFORE I began. I decided that I would use an authoritative and educational voice but not sound bossy. I decided that my branding would feel more old school and carry the warm colors of red and yellow along with the vintage font that I purchased specifically for the First Class Founders wordmark. Heck, even my profile photo looks like a black & white portrait photo taken out of a 1960s high school yearbook. I also chose the airplane motif combined with the luxury of first-class travel to symbolize achieving success. I have consistently tried to use this messaging in all my communication - it is why I use the airplane emoji next to my name on Twitter, you know?!

That's the consistency I am talking about - consistency in your:

- Voice
- Branding
- Messaging

This isn't new information, by the way. This is simply marketing 101. This is the very first thing that students of marketing learn in the very first class they attend on the subject. Brands often have detailed style guides - sometimes called Brand Bibles. What are Brand Bibles? They are simply detailed documentation of how to get these three things right for the brand in question - voice, branding, and messaging.

So, where should you be consistent? Uh, everywhere. From your published content to your social media profile. Or, in other words, from your scripted content to your unscripted content.

Coke being sappy and Pepsi being, uh, Pepsi both on twitter AND in their ads isn't a fluke. It's the identity they chose for themselves and they strive to keep up the identity consistently, everywhere.

Because that's how people remember you. And that's what I am referring to, with my final lesson:

LESSON FIVE: Consistency in everything is key.

Those are the five key lessons I learned in the last five months of growing my newsletter to 3000 subscribers. Some of them you have known and some have, hopefully, come as a revelation to you. Regardless, I hope you use ALL five of them to grow your own newsletter.

And if you are on Beehiiv, you can always apply to Boost your newsletter on First Class Founders - I am always looking for good content to collaborate and promote, so don't hesitate to reach out!

Before we wrap up today's episode, let's quickly summarize these five lessons.

LESSON ONE: Paid ads are underrated.

If you know your content-audience fit, then you can use targeted paid ads to reach the exact kind of person that would not just be interested in your content but also appreciate and enjoy it!

LESSON TWO: Auto-DMs are your friend.

Automated DMs are considered spammy, but if you do it right, you can set up your auto-DMs in a way that will result in people THANKING you for your DM!

LESSON THREE: Cross promotions aren't great at this stage.

Cross-promotions work a lot better at higher subscriber numbers because there’s simply more eyeballs which means more clicks and more subscribers.. If you are doing cross-promos with smaller subscriber numbers, keep your expectations low.

LESSON FOUR: Swapping recommendations is magical.

Swapping recommendations is like cross-promos but with entire newsletters rather than specific editions. It works really well, especially if you find another newsletter that happens to cater to the same audience as yours.

And finally,

LESSON FIVE: Consistency in everything is key.

Sure, you need to be consistent with your publishing schedule but, more importantly, you need to be consistent with your content-identity. That is, you need to have a consistent voice, branding, and messaging across all your content channels - from scripted media to unscripted interactions.

I have a BONUS lesson for those of you who patiently stayed with me up to this point. Actually, it is something you have heard me say a number of times.

BONUS LESSON: Build your newsletter in public.

I say that about all ventures but I feel this is especially applicable to newsletters. And I'm saying that from experience. I have been building my newsletter in public and I've received some amazing love from the community over the past five - now six - months.

I must also clarify here that building in public doesn't mean just self-promoting your newsletter. It means sharing what you are learning in your journey, so others can benefit from it. It means revealing the nuts and bolts of your process and, occasionally, laying bare your soul to complete strangers...

Which is what, I hope, I was able to do with this podcast episode. So, if this episode has helped you in any way, maybe give me a shoutout on Twitter? Or, even better, head over to FirstClassFounders.com/review and leave the podcast a five-star review? I’ll leave a link in the show notes - thanks in advance!

Alright, that wraps up today's show! 

In the next episode of First Class Founders, we’re talking to Clint Murphy, a Podcaster who has skyrocketed his audience growth in the last couple years. Clint is on a mission to help millions of people achieve more, better, faster. This conversation was a masterclass in audience building from someone who is an expert in audience growth. So tune in next week!

And, one last thing before I go... If you're a new listener and you enjoyed this episode, you can follow the show by going to FirstClassFounders.com and clicking on the link that matches your preferred podcast player - like Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Or, you can also add YOUR voice to the show by leaving a message on firstclassfounders.com - for example, what did you think of this episode specifically?

If you wanna connect with me, you can hit me up on Twitter @YongSooChung. I’m pretty active there and would love to connect with you. You can find links to all my social accounts in the show notes.

I'll see you on the next episode of First Class Founders.